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The Kellex Corporation was a wholly owned subsidiary of
M. W. Kellogg Company KBR, Inc. (formerly Kellogg Brown & Root) is a U.S. based company operating in fields of science, technology and engineering. KBR works in various markets including aerospace, defense, industrial and intelligence. After Halliburton acquired Dress ...
. Kellex was formed in 1942 so that Kellogg's operations relating to the
Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking during World War II that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States with the support of the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the project w ...
could be kept separate and secret. "Kell" stood for "Kellogg" and "X" for secret. The new company's goal was to design a facility for the production of
enriched uranium Enriched uranium is a type of uranium in which the percent composition of uranium-235 (written 235U) has been increased through the process of isotope separation. Naturally occurring uranium is composed of three major isotopes: uranium-238 (238U ...
through gaseous diffusion. In gaseous diffusion, isotopes of
Uranium-235 Uranium-235 (235U or U-235) is an isotope of uranium making up about 0.72% of natural uranium. Unlike the predominant isotope uranium-238, it is fissile, i.e., it can sustain a nuclear chain reaction. It is the only fissile isotope that exi ...
could be separated from
Uranium-238 Uranium-238 (238U or U-238) is the most common isotope of uranium found in nature, with a relative abundance of 99%. Unlike uranium-235, it is non-fissile, which means it cannot sustain a chain reaction in a thermal-neutron reactor. However ...
by turning uranium metal into uranium hexafluoride gas and straining it through a barrier material.


History

The
M. W. Kellogg Company KBR, Inc. (formerly Kellogg Brown & Root) is a U.S. based company operating in fields of science, technology and engineering. KBR works in various markets including aerospace, defense, industrial and intelligence. After Halliburton acquired Dress ...
, headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey, specialized in chemical engineering projects. A year before the Manhattan Project began, the
S-1 Section The S-1 Executive Committee laid the groundwork for the Manhattan Project by initiating and coordinating the early research efforts in the United States, and liaising with the Tube Alloys Project in Britain. In the wake of the discovery of nucle ...
of the
Office of Scientific Research and Development The Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) was an agency of the United States federal government created to coordinate scientific research for military purposes during World War II. Arrangements were made for its creation during May 1 ...
asked Kellogg to work with
John R. Dunning John Ray Dunning (September 24, 1907 – August 25, 1975) was an American physicist who played key roles in the Manhattan Project that developed the first atomic bombs. He specialized in neutron physics, and did pioneering work in gaseous diffusio ...
and other scientists at
Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
to ascertain the feasibility of gaseous diffusion. The pilot project at Kellogg was led by Percival C. "Dobie" Keith, vice-president of engineering at Kellogg, with A. L. Baker as Project Manager, and J. H. Arnold as Director of Research and Development. The work that Kellogg and Keith were doing on the pilot project made them obvious choices when the Manhattan Project looked for a company to create a production level processing plant. The newly formed Kellex company was headquartered in the
Woolworth Building The Woolworth Building is an early American skyscraper designed by architect Cass Gilbert located at 233 Broadway in the Tribeca neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It was the tallest building in the world from 1913 to 1930, with a ...
in
Lower Manhattan Lower Manhattan (also known as Downtown Manhattan or Downtown New York) is the southernmost part of Manhattan, the central borough for business, culture, and government in New York City, which is the most populated city in the United States with ...
, co-located with the New York Area Engineers Office, which oversaw the contract and the nearly one hundred
Special Engineer Detachment The Special Engineer Detachment (SED) was a US Army program that identified enlisted personnel with technical skills, such as machining, or who had some science education beyond high school. Those identified were organized into the Special Engineer ...
personnel which had been assigned to the firm headquarters. Kellex facilities were also located at
Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
's Nash Garage Building in New York City, in
Decatur, Illinois Decatur ( ) is the largest city and the county seat of Macon County in the U.S. state of Illinois, with a population of 70,522 as of the 2020 Census. The city was founded in 1829 and is situated along the Sangamon River and Lake Decatur in C ...
, in Kellogg's Jersey City plant, and at the
Clinton Engineer Works The Clinton Engineer Works (CEW) was the production installation of the Manhattan Project that during World War II produced the enriched uranium used in the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima, as well as the first examples of reactor-produced plu ...
in
Oak Ridge, Tennessee Oak Ridge is a city in Anderson County, Tennessee, Anderson and Roane County, Tennessee, Roane counties in the East Tennessee, eastern part of the U.S. state of Tennessee, about west of downtown Knoxville, Tennessee, Knoxville. Oak Ridge's popu ...
. Kellex was charged with developing processes and equipment and to design the plant. Several technical challenges needed to be met before gas extraction techniques could be effectively applied to separation of uranium. Such a system would need an adequate porous barrier, a workable gas pump, and a pipe that could resist the corrosive effects of uranium hexafluoride gas. Scientists developed and tested different possible processes for uranium extraction at various locations. These included a pilot gaseous diffusion plant built at Columbia University in the Nash Garage Building at 3280 Broadway, New York, NY. Scientists and engineers were developing technology for the proposed production plant at the same time that architects were designing a building to house it. The project was known as K-25; "K" stood for Kellex while "25" was a common designation for uranium-235 during the Manhattan project. The K-25 production plant at the Clinton Engineer Works was built by the J. A. Jones Construction Company. The mile-long, U-shaped plant covered , was four stories high and contained hundreds of miles of specially coated, hermetically sealed pipes and equipment. The K-25 plant was the single most expensive facility of the Manhattan Project. Once built it was operated by the Carbide and Carbon Chemicals Corporation. In 1950, Kellex Corporation was acquired by
Vitro Corporation Vitro Corporation was a major United States defense contractor which became part of BAE Systems Inc. in 1999. History Vitro was incorporated in 1950 as the Vitro Manufacturing Company. Its main product was slide transparencies for overhead proje ...
.


References

{{Authority control 1942 establishments in New York City Manhattan Project Nuclear history of the United States Companies based in New York City American companies established in 1942 Manufacturing companies established in 1942